


set a fire in my head

by runthemredlightsbabe



Series: pieces [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Flower Shop & Tattoo Parlor, M/M, here we go kids, oh boy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2017-01-11
Packaged: 2018-09-16 19:04:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9285761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runthemredlightsbabe/pseuds/runthemredlightsbabe
Summary: “Fuck the customer,” Yamaguchi sings vehemently. “Which, may I tell you, is harder than it sounds. Do you know how long I’ve been trying to get into Tsukishima’s pants?”“No, but I’m sure you do.”“Eight months, two weeks and five days,” Yamaguchi moans, emerging with a bag of instant in one hand. “But it’s like he’s totally blind. I don’t know what those glasses of his are doing, but it certainly isn’t their job, because I have been making myselfobscenelyclear.”“You have a sex-drive the size of China.”“I do not. I just want to lick his abs.”“Heathen,” Keiji declares, and Tadashi shoves him into the sink.





	

**Author's Note:**

> based on [Thorahathi's](http://thorahathi.tumblr.com/post/146504523267/bokuto-is-all-lookwho-ive-metaaaa) tattoo AU. please enjoy all of her gorgeous art. 
> 
> Shout-out to my friend [crowswillfly](http://crowswillfly.tumblr.com/) as a beta and also as a generally great kid. Her playlist (of which the title is based on) can be found [here](http://8tracks.com/skihale/pieces) (8tracks) or [here](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2UINVOA5TkdluzDa1oJ2RbL1SQR7psNp) (youtube)
> 
> Title from "Trouble" by Halsey

Akaashi isn’t one for overdramatics, so when he lets himself through the back door of Tinta De Cuervos and finds someone has set the trashcan on fire, he doesn’t make a scene.

“How long has this been burning?” He asks Kageyama as the young boy comes around the corner, looking irate and clutching Simon The Temperamental Coffee Pot. He receives a noncommittal salute-shrug that suggests the burn time is esoteric but probably lengthy. Akaashi refrains from rolling his eyes and changes tactics. “Where are they?”

The culprit is sitting on top of the fridge in the kitchen. Reproachful tawny eyes meet Akaashi’s warily, and Kenma holds out their gameboy defensively. “For the record, there was a bug.”

“You had to torch it?” Akaashi asks. He opens the fridge, digs beneath the decoy vegetables for his melon bread.

“It had wings,” Kenma says emphatically, as if they can't imagine anything as morally offensive. They lean down to paw at Keiji’s snack. “I couldn’t let it get away. That would be indecent.”

“To who?” Akaashi asks, smacking their hand away.

“Everyone,” Kenma says gravely. “I’m doing this office a favor. Pest control.”

“You set a garbage can on fire.”

“Potato tomato. Please give me some of that.”

Akaashi sticks his tongue out. “I’m sorry, we don’t serve pyromaniacs here. It’s indecent.”

Kenma makes the same low-throated growling sound as cats do when they’re frustrated. “But I _want_ it.”

“No,” Keiji growls back and makes a faux hissing sound. “Bad kitty.”

“Fire’s out!” Kageyama calls, before Kenma can retaliate. There’s a beat. “Umm, also, Tadashi’s asleep on the floor over here.”

“Leave him,” Kenma calls back. “He stayed up all night finishing the new layout.”

“He’s kind of in the way.”

“Leave him alone, Kageyama.” Kageyama appears a few moments later, bedhead looking a little worse for the wear. He has ash on his shirt and a guilty look on his face. A yawning Tadashi follows. “Why didn’t the fire alarm go off?”

“Oh, we don’t have one,” Tadashi says, nonchalantly. Face still clogged by sleep, he stretches. “Whenever it went off, Kenma would go and hide in the ceiling and then we’d have to cut them out because they’d get stuck.”

“You don’t even need them,” Kenma says. “The whole ‘fire safety’ bit is just a smokescreen. They’re actually part of the American government’s secret plan to take over the world using a series of consumerist household objects as a complex surveillance system. The headquarters are in Taxes.”

“Texas,” Tadashi corrects.

“Whatever,” Kenma returns to their game. “And anyway, they’re stupid and make loud noises and I hate them.” Kageyama is so stunned that he needs a handful of heartbeats to process.

“You are a walking disaster,” He says eventually. “How are you older than me?”

“Go stick your head in a blender,” Kenma retorts curtly, as Akaashi and Yamaguchi burst into laughter. “All of you are going to burn in hell.”

“Only if you don’t set us on fire, first,” Akaashi agrees. “Speaking of, where is Noya? I distinctly remember that he’s supposed to be here, and he’s not.”

“And this is news?” Tadashi raises an eyebrow.

“No," Akaashi grumbles. "So he’s not here.”

There are diligent head nods.

“And no one decided to you know, open? This place? That you work at? For _money_?”

Alarmed looks from all around.

“There was a bug?” Kenma tries.

___

Tinta De Cuervos was something of an accident. They hadn’t really thought it would pan out; it had just been the crazy pipedream of three kids with very little to lose and a whole lot to let go of. Keiji’d always been good with a pen, and Tadashi had a way with words, and Yuu was everything in between; the guts and the voice and the hot-blooded fire carrying them through.

Really, the whole thing had just been a montage of freak accidents and lucky coincidences. Tears and sweat. Weeks of empty bank accounts eating away at negative digits. Hundreds of empty take-out containers. Stale coffee and sleepless nights of paperwork and bills and _we can’t do this, there’s no money, we have no money, this is insane_.

Akaashi isn’t quite sure how they managed it, how they survived, the three of them, kids with nowhere better to go and the whole of Tokyo waiting for them to fail. But they did. And here he is. Here they are.

Tinta De Cuervos isn’t famous in the tattoo world, not really, but it’s almost sort of kind of getting there. Tokyo is the city of hipster criminals with an ego and handfuls of money to waste, and Tinta De Cuervos is more or less their royal plunder. It’s sort of weird, seeing people with studded earrings and so much that their wallet actually bulges with 1,000 yen bills at their doorstep, but who’s Akaashi to judge when it’s going towards the rent?

What’s possibly more surprising than being successful (people call them the ‘underdogs’, as if this was some shitty American coming-of-age story and not the desperate tale of an orphaned boy from Tokyo with a sum of bruises cut beneath his skin like skeletons doing his best to care for the only family he’s ever had) is that Akaashi’s actually part of the catalyst reaction.

They like his stuff, the hipster criminals. They want his ink on their skin, want his lame attempts at digging his name into the earthen stone of underworld gravemarkers (so maybe he and his friends won’t be forgotten, not right away).

He opens Tinta De Cuervos at exactly 17:03, hits the lights in the main room, flips on the speakers, waters the extensive collection of bonsai and bamboo plants Noya has cultivated from their neighbors, gathers his ink and needles and cloth, traces his outline in the mirror (nothing good there, just some smudged eyeliner, rough cheekbones, and hair that can’t ever seem to figure itself out), and makes sure that the fire is really out (it is).

His first appointment is in an hour, and he’s dreading it.

“The problem with tourists,” He decides, boosted up on the counter as Tadashi works his way through the cabinets in search of coffee. “Is that they have a terrible superiority complex. They think I am hanging off of every word out of their mouths. ‘Customer is always right’, my ass. Fuck the customer.”

“Fuck the customer,” Yamaguchi sings vehemently. “Which, may I tell you, is harder than it sounds. Do you know how long I’ve been trying to get into Tsukishima’s pants?”

“No, but I’m sure you do.”

“Eight months, two weeks and five days,” Yamaguchi moans, emerging with a bag of instant in one hand. “But it’s like he’s totally blind. I don’t know what those glasses of his are doing, but it certainly isn’t their job, because I have been making myself _obscenely_ clear.”

“You have a sex-drive the size of China.”

“I do not. I just want to lick his abs.”

“Heathen,” Keiji declares, and Tadashi shoves him into the sink.

___

Some hours later, long after the city lights of Ikebukuro have stained the sky red and gold and orange, Akaashi is sitting in the back room, listening to Saeko complain about her little brother.

“He’s gotten arrested _again_ ,” She moans, head in her hands. Kenma pats her sympathetically. “I love him, god knows I love that stupid kid; if I didn’t, I’d have dumped his ass to the curb when this whole eco-terrorist thing started. And I know that what he’s doing is important. I support him, I support the cause, but what if he wants to go to college some day? What if he gets caught up in serious shit? What if he gets caught and he isn’t a minor anymore? I’d do anything for Ryuu, but I can’t protect him from the future.”

“Have you talked to him about it?” Tadashi asks gently, offering her a cup of tea. “He loves you a lot, Saeko. Maybe if he knew how anxious it made you, he’d stop.”

“She doesn’t want him to stop,” Akaashi sighs.

“He’s right,” Saeko half-laughs, running a jittery hand through her hair. Her roots are showing again, and Akaashi knows how much she must hate it. “My brother’s making a difference, and he loves it. I can tell how much he loves it. Seeing him happy makes me happy. I can’t ruin something so important to him.”

“That’s really admirable,” Kageyama says, though Akaashi can’t place when the boy had snuck into the conversation. “And selfless.”

“Thanks, kiddo,” Saeko leans over and ruffles Kageyama’s hair. “Let me ask you something, Grumps. You’re a teenager, yeah?”

“Uh, yes.”

“Is he going to burn out? Grow up and regret it all?”

Kageyama looks down at his shoes. “Umm. I don’t really know. I mean, he’s young but that doesn’t mean he’s not smart. I… teenagers… we’re not stupid, you know? We know what we’re signing up for. So… umm. Yeah. Probably not.”

“Eloquent,” Kenma mutters, and Kageyama flushes.

“Aww, leave him alone, Sugar,” Saeko chides, “I believe him.” She slips off her desk, swinging her leather jacket over her shoulder. “Alright. I’m going to be busy for the next few hours, but I’m scheduled with a tongue piercing and a couple of gauges so you nerds are going to have to figure it out amongst yourselves.”

“I can cover for you,” Yamaguchi promises. “But uhh, Kenma, do you mind picking the next one up for me? It’s a really basic outline. Shouldn’t be more than thirty minutes.”

“Sure,” Kenma says.

“Has anyone heard from Nishinoya?” Saeko asks. “I haven’t seen him around tonight, yet.”

“He never showed up,” Kageyama sighs.

“Five hundred yen he’s next door ogling that ginger kid,” Tadashi crows.

“One thousand,” Kenma scoffs. “Easy.”

“I’ll go get him,” Akaashi offers.

No one argues.

___

As Akaashi exits the rushing warmth of the office and steps out along the lined curb, he considers Tinta De Cuervos’s best-kept enigma. Hailing from a half-Spanish bloodline, Nishinoya is pugnaciously energetic, like an electrical spark charged with caffeine. He is one of Akaashi’s oldest and closest friends, and is, among many other things, the visionary to Tinto de Cuervo's existence. He's like a Banksy exhibit - wild, unfiltered, impulsive, and bred for change.

(While befriending Nishinoya Yuu came with a long list of invaluable perks, it also meant being the cruel reminder every few days that humans aren’t actually born to fly)

The small bell chimes over Akaashi’s head as he slips into Mayonaka no Hana, the midnight flower shop up the street from Tinta De Cuervos. They have an odd relationship, the Flowers and the Crows, one that is a perpetual source of nonsense. Why it came to be, or why the wildly different shops are so exhaustingly close probably has something to do with the fact that they are the only two stores on the block not associated with the underground drug dens. (They’re not so bad, the druggies. They leave Tinto de Cuervos alone in exchange for free services, and even sometimes bring pan-stickers or curry buns from their escapades)

He’s met with the unrequited scent of living things as he enters; moss and ferns and roots and soil, buds and flowers and fruits and seeds. Mayonaka no Hana is built more like a terrarium than a flower shop, rose and linden and evergreens growing directly out of the stone-tiled floor, moss and succulents carpeting the walls and along the lines of running water. Tall, earth-scented ferns and thousand-jewel lilies, delicate bromeliads hung on silver strings, thick-rooted holly and jasmine beside lemon and strawberry and bamboo. Orchids obscure the counter where Kiyoko wraps young tulips in thin tissue paper. The shop thrums with life, the breath of growing things palpable in the air.

He gets a curious look from Kiyoko. Tsukishima studiously ignores him in favor of the bed of arid cacti at his feet. Kuroo has his hands full with a display of vibrant poppies, but he catches Akaashi’s eye and gestures nonchalantly towards the back.

 _Thanks_ , Akaashi thinks, but it’s a waste of breath. His encounters with the tiger-eyed boy are numbered, but they remain vivid - strong shots of burning alcohol, a heavy, molasses-smooth drawl, and a thousand questions timed to the beat of a bassline. He is built like a warning sign, a study in subtle, calculative trouble, and for a while, Keiji avoided him. But he’s an old, old friend of his brother, and the closest thing to romance that Kenma seems comfortable with. And Kenma always knows with people. They’re intuitive. Like a cat. Or maybe a chicken. (Akaashi does his best to get along with Kuroo.)

In theory, Akaashi knows his way around Mayonaka no Hana, but he lets curiosity take the better of him, and ends up in the greenhouses instead of the back office, where he suspects Nishinoya is drooling all over his attractive and abnormally small boyfriend. His meandering doubles as an attempt to avoid his brother, something that he realizes as he bends down to examine a crate full of young sprouts labeled 'poppies'.

 _That’s because he’s a menace to society_ , Akaashi decides, moving on to the next plot of dark black soil. It’s especially hot and humid in the greenhouse, exposed to the mid-summer heat of Japan. He can hear the buzz of the city - Tokyo never does seem to settle, especially not the district of the night - but the hum of life is muted by the lull of living things.

He shouldn’t be surprised to bump into an employee, but he’s still a little taken-aback.

The guy is half-hidden behind a stack of cinder-colored pots, muttering to himself in lilted Korean. Really, the only reason Akaashi notices him at first is because of his jacket. It looks a bit like it’s been cut from a patchwork quilt of fruit smoothies; banana-yellow, strawberry-pink and melon-green best found in Harajuku’s eccentric Indie stores. His hair, too, is noticeably odd, a strange exchange of inebriated white with ash and charcoal and black. It hangs limp and soft, rustling like feathers in the breeze from the open windows.

It takes the boy a bit more time to notice Akaashi. When he does, he drops the sprout cradled to his chest.

“Gah,” says the boy.

“Hello.”

“You scared me,” The gardener rights the fallen sapling in a carton of blank soil, and smudges his cheek with dirt. He’s got soft cheekbones and a curved jaw, wide golden eyes like splints of honey in the low light. “You’re not supposed to be back here, you know. The shop’s up front.”

“I’m not a customer.”

The boy tips his head to the side. “You don’t work here, though.”

“No.”

“And I didn’t order anything.”

“I suppose you didn’t.”

“So why’re you here, then?” The boy’s eyes crinkle when he laughs. “Are we being robbed?”

“No.”

“That’s good, because I don’t know what I’d do in a robbery. Probably panic.”

Akaashi blinks. “I’m from Tinta de Cuervos.”

“Oh,” Recognition dawns across the boy’s open face like spilled flour. “You’re looking for Noya.”

“Yes.”

“Okay!” The gardener brushes his hands off on his jeans and stands up. He’s very tall. “I think he and Hinata are in the order room. I’ll take you.”

Akaashi’s half-formed _no, I can make it there myself, thank you_ dies on his tongue as the boy stretches out a hand with a kind and hopeful smile. Uncertain and overtaken by curiosity, Akaashi aligns just the tips of his fingers with the broad strokes of the gardener’s palm.

As the boy leads him back through the maze of young plants, he rambles incessantly about the plants, about the soil, about the weather and his clothes and his coworkers and the fact that he had really good yakudon from the hole-in-the-wall three doors down. Akaashi listens absently, focused mostly on the warm fingers clutching his, because oh good, touching, Akaashi _loves_ to be touched by strangers.

___

Nishinoya is covered in paint when Akaashi finds him.

Now, Nishinoya is usually covered in paint, but Keiji wonders if maybe he’s outdone himself, because the boy is more acrylic color than skin. He sits on the blank wooden floor, stretched out on a thin canvas tarp, wreathing together a bouquet of lilacs. There’s a heavy head of brilliant ginger hair asleep on his lap, orange curls threaded with white daisies. Noya breaks out into a bright smile when he spies Akaashi, and gestures wildly between himself, the unconscious body, and Keiji.

 _I’m sorry, I just came to visit but then he was finishing these wedding bouquets and he’s cute and there were cookies and now he’s asleep and what am I supposed to do, wake him up? No way!_ Is basically the gist.

Akaashi gives him a hard glare, but the stranger with manic hair laughs.

“I think they’re busy,” He whispers to Keiji. “If you want, I can send him over when Shrimp wakes up.”

“I suppose,” Keiji murmurs back, and mouths ‘you’re going to get it’ over his shoulder. Nishinoya looks justifiably alarmed. “Thank you.”

“No problem, no problem,” The pastel boy promises, waving his hands. “I’m Bokuto, by the way. Bokuto Koutarou. I’m in charge of the sprouts and the seeds. Growing stuff.”

“Akaashi Keiji,” Bokuto’s palm is warm in Keiji’s, callused and rough, tattered with scars. “I’m the head tattoo artist.”

“I know,” Bokuto says, and then upon Akaashi’s crooked look, cringes, “Uh, sorry. It’s weird. I know it’s weird. Umm, Noya and Hinata talk about you a lot. And also your brother. A… lot.”

“Oh,” Akaashi isn’t sure how to take that. “They haven’t told you all my secrets, have they, Bokuto-san?”

“Just Bokuto,” The paper-and-graphite-haired boy winks. “And no, of course not. Only good things. Really. I promise.”

“Okay,” Akaashi allows. The boy’s eyes are too sincere. “It was nice to meet you, Bokuto, but I should really get back to work.”

“You too, Akaashi!” Bokuto rubs at the soil smudged on his cheek, makes it worse. “I can walk you out, if you’d like.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Akaashi holds up a hand, and it sounds sharp and inappropriate in his mouth, but the gardener only looks a little deflated. “Good night.”

“‘Night, Akaashi!” Koutarou says. “See you soon!”

Akaashi doesn’t look back, but he can feel the wide-eyed golden eyes following him all the way out the front door. He shivers a little, and wonders why his name sounded like a song on the boy’s tongue.

___

At exactly two thirty in the early morning, Akaashi leaves Tinta de Cuervos to a chorus of ‘good night!’s and the distinct sounds of Kageyama getting in a fight with Simon. As he pauses in the alley to apply a rough line of charcoal, he notices a dark flower poised in the windowsill of his reflection. It’s fresh cut, with glob-like petals, indistinguishably colored in the murky light of the street. There is a rough paper beneath it, folded all mismatched and crumpled. With his name on it.

He takes the flower gingerly, touches the soft stem and clean-scented petals, admires the way it curls naturally into his palm. He takes the paper, too, notices the scuffed edges and stains.

He is interrupted from his quiet awe by his phone - a dark, rumbling buzz in his that makes his stomach turn over. In the heat of the moment, between the sing-song voice on the other line and searching for the right address under an angry streetlight, the flower and note end up tossed into his bag and forgotten.

He won’t find it until later, when he’s panting, shaking, bruised from his wrists to his toes, eyeliner smudged against lipgloss and sweat and tears, clothes ripped, hair unkempt, bent over in an alleyway, looking for his wallet and his phone. He touches the flower again, fingers trembling and cautious. It’s a little crushed, and some of the petals leak a dark dye, but when he holds it up, it curls into the palm of his hand.

And then something happens.

_Hey!_

_I’m your secret admirer! And even if it’s not a secret because stupid Kuroo told on me, you have to pretend it is, okay? Because this is supposed to be a secret! Shh! I’m just your secret admirer sending you flowers because flowers are beautiful and cool and everyone needs more flowers in their life._

_This is a dahlia. They’re really hard to grow in Japan because they don’t like the soil. Too much moisture and dirt. They like rocks. But I know how to grow them. It’s like my super power. I can grow stuff. Which is cool, but have you ever seen that American movie with the plant that’s actually from outer space and eats people? That’s really cool. I’d find a way to not give it blood, though, because that’s pretty dark. But it’s also metaphorical, ya know? He put everything into the plant! Literally! He gave it blood! That’s freaky, man! It ate his girlfriend!_

_Anyway, anyway, I’m getting off track. So there’s this thing, it’s called the language of flowers, and I don’t know if that’s really its name, but we’re going to go with it, because it sounds cool. Anyway, people give each other flowers, and they want the flowers to mean something, right? They actually do, except people don’t know that, so they end up giving the person they have a crush on mint or lime blossoms or something, which are great and smell good, but like, in flower language, mint means suspicious and lime blossoms mean sex, so they’re basically saying “I am suspicious of you, and would like to get in your pants”._

_Look, what I’m trying to get at is that I think you’re elegant. Like, graceful and composed and quiet. Beautiful, you know. Like you’re all put-together and wonderful._

_You can put it in water if you like. Or hang it. Or you can like, throw it out, because a secret admirer is a little bit creepy, no matter how you slice it. Even though I’m nice! I promise! Totally harmless. Sometimes, I have to call Tsukishima to come get the spiders out of my room. He always hangs up on me._

_I’m running out of space, so I guess this is where I say goodnight! I hope you find this soon. The flower really does remind me of you. Sleep well, okay? And drink water!_

Akaashi is panting, shaking, bruised from his wrists to his toes, eyeliner smudged against lipgloss and sweat and tears, clothes ripped, hair unkempt, bent over in an alleyway, frozen in the search for his wallet and his phone. And his hands are trembling as he reads the letter once, twice, three times, ghosts over the smudged ink. The five or six attempts at his kanji. The tiny, terrible flower in the left-hand corner.

 _Elegant,_ The flower says, and Akaashi cradles it in his careful hands and hopes he doesn’t stain it with blood.

**Author's Note:**

> I have been working on this for a very long time. Lots of stolen effort and time have gone into making it. There are lots of good moments and lots of bad moments, and it follows a little lost soul in Tokyo and the power of protecting people. 
> 
> This is part 1 of 10.
> 
> come bother me on [tumblr](http://iamtherabbitwhisperer.tumblr.com/)


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